As I travel along the Information Superhighway (yes, I still call the Internet that) I sometimes run across a Catholic who had inspired alcoholics and addicts and whose cause for beatification in underway. Such is the case for Ven. Enzo Boschetti.  He lived from November 19, 1929 to February 15, 1993 and served as a friar in the Carmelite Order and worked as a missionary in Kuwait until he returned to Italy to serve as a diocesan priest. Ven. Boschetti founded the Casa del Giovane Community which provides hospitality to young people with drug addiction problems. According to the website their mission is to:

The “Casa del Giovane” Community is a non-profit organization founded by Don Enzo Boschetti in 1971 to provide hospitality to young people with drug addiction problems. Today it presents itself as a reality of welcome and help to face various situations of social distress, proposing an educational path based on the principles of essentiality, sharing, coherence and responsibility. The Community aims to “implement concrete forms of social responsibility for all those who are in a position of hardship”, through the provision of services at a preventive, educational, therapeutic, training, cultural and professional level.

It welcomes minors with family problems, foreign minors, young people with addiction problems, single mothers with children, people with mental disabilities and homeless people. It also welcomes young people and girls who wish to live the experience of sharing, free service and prayer in a community style. The answers to needs are articulated in the proposal of day services (listening center, day center for minors, mental health centers, pedagogical-rehabilitation day center) and residential (therapeutic communities, educational communities for minors, communities for mothers with children).

I bring this up because I am always interested in Catholic approaches to addiction recovery. The links in the first paragraph take you to informative site, and when you get there, I strongly urge you to follow other links about their work, success stories, the life of Ven Boschetti and so on. It’s a worthy link trail! (NOTE: The sites are all in Italian, but most browsers have a translation function.)

I have a new book! "The Sober Catholic Way" is a handbook on how anyone can live a sober life, drawn from over 17 years of SoberCatholic posts! It's out now on "Amazon," "Apple Books," "B&N" and and others!"!

My two other books are still available! "The Stations of the Cross for Alcoholics" and "The Recovery Rosary: Reflections for Alcoholics and Addicts" (Thank you!!)